One Piece 619 – Ehhhh?!

As confirmed, Hodi really is that weak without his pills, which goes to show how much the Strawhats (at least Zoro) have jumped in power. This could mean we’ll be getting win after win for the Strawhats, but after them struggling with enemies (since the series started really), I don’t think I’d mind seeing the crew obliterate everything in its path for a while. After all, there’s way too many stronger enemies at this point to be moping around on Fishman Island (Supernovas, Blackbeard’s crew, the World Government, and those large unexplained creepy things in Florian Triangle o:). Regardless, Hodi’s still an obstacle, and we’re left with Zoro close to drowning.

Jinbei pulling an Enel-face was the last thing I expected from his character, but he did it, and he did it twice. I suppose no character in OP can ever keep their “serious-virginity” at all times, and for those that haven’t happened yet (Hawkeye, the Admirals), it won’t be long. You can’t hide from Oda, he created you! It’s hard to tell the exact importance of Jinbe’s long awaited message, and I think the message will affect Nami far more than Luffy, so Nami’s appearance is quite convenient. Jinbe’s a guy who stands by his principles, so revealing regrets about his past is natural. However, I don’t think it’s a big deal, as Jinbe’s done far more than enough for the pirates, and the crew isn’t exactly an unforgiving bunch. That said, Luffy didn’t get as riled up about Hachi’s injuries as I thought, and his character is a bit different than pre-timeskip, so there might be more to this than I’m expecting. More importantly, it’s the other question I’m still wondering about; why didn’t he want the crew to tangle with Hodi? Was it really about power differences? If that were the case, it doesn’t seem to be a problem now. It’s probably something more political, but I don’t see how any of that will matter since Hodi’s not the type to sit down and chat about their differences while sipping a cup of tea.

One Piece x Toriko Special
Oda did a Cross Epoch before this, and that was between Dragon Ball’s characters and his own. That one was more interesting since it used each character’s quirks and matched them up with one of Dragon Ball’s, whereas this new Epoch mainly used an island as the connection (and if you’ve read A Cloudy Day with a Chance of Meatballs, it’s not much of a novel idea). The two different artstyles matched up rather well, and focusing on a poop joke feels like something Oda picked up from Toriyama (the mangaka of Dragon Ball). I haven’t read Toriko, so I may have missed out on some subtle quirks their cast had (such as the character matchups at the dinner table), but if any part of their side interested you, you should check out the anime airing this spring season.

Luffy has been with Jinbe for a while now, of course, and when you couple that with how laid-back he is, I hardly think Luffy’ll care all that much about Jinbe’s final words of this chapter. Nami, on the other hand, is meeting him for the first time ever, I believe. And Arlong really f’ed her life up. She has every right to be angry, but I still can’t imagine her doing anything crazy as a result of this revelation. Do you think she’ll shrug the whole thing off completely or do you think she’ll get mad for a bit and then let it pass?

I found the special pretty entertaining. They couldn’t pair cast together like the OP/DB special because Toriko doesn’t have a nakama; he journeys with his chef Komatsu and each arc has its own characters that temporarily join his travels.

The key similarity of OP and Toriko are each take place in a largely undiscovered and dangerous world, with many enormous monsters and villains. OP is divided between New World and Old World, Toriko is divided by the Human World and Gourmet World. The world of Toriko and its monsters remind me more of DB’s world than OP. In DB “power levels” are used to gauge enemies, in OP it’s bounties, and in Toriko it’s capture level (although this only applies to beasts and not humans).

Unlike Luffy/Goku/Naruto, Toriko isn’t your cliche shonen archetype heroine. He has Goku’s appetite and Luffy’s strength (if not more), but he speaks intelligently and is very knowledgeable of the world around him (unlike Luffy). It’s a nice contrast for a popular adventure shonen.

Yeah, I probably would’ve gotten more out of it had I been a reader of Toriko. I still think the “story” was too weak to be that entertaining, but so was the other Epoch. They’re just specials/fan-service anyway, so I don’t think a story effort was really cared for.

Wait, wasn’t Shirahoshi’s mother poisoned? Or did I read the chapter wrong?

Also, Jinbe embraces the power of “The Enel Face”. Totally caught me off guard. Technical note: Kizaru and Aokiji were initially presented as aloof and not very serious personality-wise. Sure, they’ve never had an epic freak-out like Jinbe and Enel (who still holds my personal title of “Most Epic Reaction Face Ever”) had, but their “serious-virginity” was lost upon their intros to the series. Only Akainu has held onto that seriousness.

I think if they ever show Zoro’s training, they’ll be some Hawkeye slip-ups. Other than that he seemed more chill in his castle.

As for Jinbei, I think he’ll join Luffy after fishman island. Here we see he is resolving differences in his own way by expressing his regret for Arlong in front of Nami. Plus the crew needs a fishman and a 10th member. Now is as good a time as any, since they are heading into the new world. He could probably be that “trivial information guide” that mentions random important details kind of like Robin did at times when they all came to a new location.

http://onepiece.wikia.com/wiki/Florian_Triangle
The shadows you were talking about are a totally different thing. Florian Triangle encompassed the Thriller Bark arc, which was way after Skypiea. The huge monsters are still unexplained.

Her being imprisoned could be the actual reason for not attending the funeral, but it was stated that Queen Otohime was assassinated in broad daylight, so I don’t think she was poisoned. It might’ve been a mistranslation.

Well, I’m sure Jimbei is quite in a huge turmoil right now. In his reunion with Luffy, Jimbei is already having a hard time with him since he is giving him so much of a hard time.

I’m also shocked to see that Hodi so strong after taking that drug, a shame that Zoro was out of breath, otherwise Hodi would be killed the moment Zoro was able to put his sword on him. Hopefully the soldiers would tell people the news about how the Straw hats are likely innocent of any possible destruction that would happen in the future. I mean, Luffy is OUTSIDE fishmen island, so what can he do.

I was a little disappointed that they had to use such a cheap plot device such as running out of breadth to take Zoro out. You can see that Usopp and Brook are using air bubbles, so why didn’t Zoro take one too. Also, I know time is relative in manga, but it seemed like Sanji was able to hold his breadth under water for much longer back in the Arlong arc.
Anyway, I’m not complaining that much but I think it would have been much better if Zoro’s group were not captured and had to deal with Hodi and his crew separately while Luffy and co. handled Decken and whatever conspiracy killed the queen in the past.

I thought Zoro took another breath after slashing Hodi. Damn, I agree that it is a bad way of plot device, until now that was just a problem for devil fruit users (Crocodile flooding Rainy base for example, only Luffy and Smoker were in trouble)

I had assumed that “Vander Decken’s Poison Fang” was not so much a literal reference. I thought it was a way of referencing his devil fruit power as a bad thing. Sort of a different way of calling it a curse. I mean, “ill-timed” seems to me like her mother died right before she got touched by Vander Decken, and because of his power, she hasn’t been able to leave her tower to see her mother’s grave.